1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a digital rights management (DRM). More particularly, the present invention relates to a DRM method and DRM-enabled mobile device.
2. Description of the Related Art
Mobile commerce (M-commerce) is becoming increasingly important as the number of mobile users grows rapidly worldwide, and the mobile networks and services expand to countrywide and worldwide coverage. M-commerce is simply a way to conduct electronic commerce using mobile devices. M-commerce usually involves multiple independent business entities as instant mobile operators, service providers, enabling technology providers, and mobile users. Coordination and interoperability has become a great concern in such a business setting. Moreover, the success of M-commerce is also dependent upon the mutual trust among these entities. For example, when intellectual property is a concern of a business, privacy and trust become requirements of the business. Furthermore, other business components, such as payment and security also play important roles in M-commerce.
Media distribution services, including video conferencing, video-on-demand, and online music distribution are major mobile businesses. Digital Rights Management (DRM) is required in media distribution services to protect the intellectual property of the distributed digital media. DRM technology includes rights insertion, rights enforcement, license management, license (or media) sharing and the like. Rights insertion and rights enforcement are responsible for basic DRM operations. License management is to manage the usage and access rights of purchased media. License (or media) sharing that involves processes of transferring rights and issuing authorization is a demanding feature in media distribution services. Payment is highly related to DRM operations, as usage and access rights are mainly due to the purchasing agreements and terms.
Rights-protected contents can be copied from a personal computer or exchanged between mobile devices using infrared technology based on Infrared Data Association (IrDA) or Bluetooth technology, or using an external memory and hard disk. Even though the rights-protected contents are copied from another device and media, the user should obtain a license to play the contents.
However, the conventional DRM method does not give an unlicensed user a chance to pre-experience a copied content, even though the unlicensed user may be an expected buyer.
The conventional DRM method also has a shortcoming in that an unlicensed user should buy a multimedia content without being able to verify whether the multimedia content is content that is expected, resulting in a risk of unwanted payment, and leading to a negative experience of the right protected contents.
Accordingly, there is a need for an improved digital rights management method and digital rights management-enabled mobile device that allows verification of multimedia content.